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Post by sloanrodgers on Mar 25, 2012 20:36:50 GMT -5
I have no brief for Houston who was after all James Grant's "bitter enemy", but I can't help observing that King's Evidence Perry was hardly an unbiased reporter given that he was arrested by Houston before the battle for some very strange behaviour I heard the big drunk wasn't even present at San Jacinto, but ravin' mad and holed up in de Zavala's cabin with a poppy pipe.
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Post by timniesen on Mar 26, 2012 11:12:19 GMT -5
Stuart, Not that I am not an expert on San Jacinto, but Col. Perry's lecture on that battle, according to Lindley, is supported by all the other accounts that he had uncovered. The only exception is his account of the Texans igniting the weeds growing above the water, and afterwards shooting the fleeing Mexican survivors as they fled that fire. Certainly, however, I would agree that Perry is not unbaised about Houston. You imply that you have uncovered evidence about the turncoat Perry in the West Indies and his alleged testimony against his fellow filibusters who had turned pirate. Tim
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Post by stuart on Mar 27, 2012 13:36:04 GMT -5
Nothing that I haven't mentioned before since it never came to trial and they were all released (minus their weaponry) as being a diplomatic embarrassment.
You'll recall that he himself gloated about how it was all a terrible misunderstanding and how splendidly he was being treated in a private house, while other of his compatriots were languishing in jail and admitting how they'd been carrying out armed robbery - just as the British records say.
Add to that the speed with which Perry made himself scarce as soon as they landed and you can draw your own not very creditable conclusion. Given that he was under arrest at the time its also questionable just how much of the battle of San Jacinto he actually saw. His account of the Alamo in that lecture was shamelessly plagiarised from Chester Newell's book so while his account of SJ may well agree with other authorities we can't rule out a very lively possibility that as with the Alamo he did lots of "research".
He may just qualify as a witness but a highly unreliable one.
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Post by timniesen on Mar 27, 2012 16:33:50 GMT -5
Stuart, That Col. Perry testified and condemned those wandering filibusters in the stranded vessel's lifeboat who turned pirate, raiding a Freedman's village for their meager food and drink, seems to show Perry as a respectable man. That the British colonial authorities rendered themselves hospitable to him certainly does not make him dishonorable in the least. And Stuart, not even Houston himself claimed that Col. Perry was not at San Jacinto. Tim
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Post by stuart on Mar 28, 2012 0:55:22 GMT -5
The Mattawamkeag may have been a little lost but it wasn't stranded so there was no justification for sticking pistols in people's faces, taking hogs and poultry, and looting Mr Williams' wine cellar, which is why, once captured they were all with the exception of your Mr Perry committed for trial "on a charge of felony and Piracy".
He may well have turned King's evidence because he was disgusted by his companions' behaviour, but it hardly made for harmony and as I suggested above probably accounts for his rapid departure as soon as they finally arrived in New Orleans.
As to San Jacinto I've no doubt either that he was present, but on the one hand being under arrest he was hardly privy to any decision making and as an individual may not have seen that much and on the other we do know from that New York episode that he was an unreliable witness and plagiarist.
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Post by timniesen on Mar 28, 2012 15:19:06 GMT -5
Stuart, If I remember correctly, Gen. Houston himself states that he had released Col. Perry before the battle. Have you found any actual documentation that, in fact, Perry was placed under arrest by Houston? That is, other than Houston's claim of his arrest for treason. Tim
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Post by sloanrodgers on Mar 28, 2012 17:10:43 GMT -5
This pirate tale sounds familiar.
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Post by timniesen on Mar 29, 2012 10:56:20 GMT -5
In regard to your plagerism charge, there is a yet to be found Perry letter or letters to an unknown New York newspaper concerning the battle of San Jacinto. I have never had the opportunity to search for this important primary source. I suspect that Perry wrote this letter or letters to an upstate New York newspaper. If he had wrote it to a New York City newspaper, I suspect that his correspondence almost certainly would have been found by now. Perhaps, Newell used this Perry account for his book. Tim
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Post by Allen Wiener on Mar 29, 2012 16:58:01 GMT -5
tim - How do we know that such a letter exists?
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Post by Jim Boylston on Mar 29, 2012 20:11:32 GMT -5
Of interest. Times Picayune, May 1, 1859. Attachments:
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Post by Jim Boylston on Mar 29, 2012 20:14:55 GMT -5
Also of interest...April 24, 1847, New London Democrat. Attachments:
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Post by sloanrodgers on Mar 29, 2012 22:33:35 GMT -5
The Mattawamkeag may have been a little lost but it wasn't stranded so there was no justification for sticking pistols in people's faces, taking hogs and poultry, and looting Mr Williams' wine cellar, which is why, once captured they were all with the exception of your Mr Perry committed for trial "on a charge of felony and Piracy". He may well have turned King's evidence because he was disgusted by his companions' behaviour, but it hardly made for harmony and as I suggested above probably accounts for his rapid departure as soon as they finally arrived in New Orleans. As to San Jacinto I've no doubt either that he was present, but on the one hand being under arrest he was hardly privy to any decision making and as an individual may not have seen that much and on the other we do know from that New York episode that he was an unreliable witness and plagiarist. I think you're being a little harsh on poor James H. Perry and holding his war memories to higher standard than other old soldiers. Rev. Perry claimed to be a graduate of West Point with honors, a veteran of three wars (Texas Revolution, Mexican War and Civil War) and voted for Gen. Houston in the first Texas election for president. How could he possibly be a unreliable witness at the battle of San Jacinto? If Rev. Perry stated that Houston fled the battleground with the mysterious Col. Collamore before the engagement and shot himself in the foot to save face among his troops, I think we should just believe Rev. Perry's tale without nitpicking over his testimony. Old soldiers and reverands never lie, they just.......
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Post by stuart on Apr 1, 2012 9:37:10 GMT -5
In regard to your plagerism charge, there is a yet to be found Perry letter or letters to an unknown New York newspaper concerning the battle of San Jacinto. I have never had the opportunity to search for this important primary source. I suspect that Perry wrote this letter or letters to an upstate New York newspaper. If he had wrote it to a New York City newspaper, I suspect that his correspondence almost certainly would have been found by now. Perhaps, Newell used this Perry account for his book. Tim The plagiarism I referred to was his account of the Alamo, lifted almost word for word from Newell and setting the early date of Newell's book against the later date of Perry's lecture I see no justification for pretending that Newell was plagiaring Perry rather than the other way around. Newell's book certainly drew, word for word on a number of sources, but he normally identified them. Here's an extract from a brief bio in the Portal to Texas History: NEWELL, CHESTER (1803–1892). Chester Newell, Episcopal clergyman, was born in Massachusetts on July 8, 1803; he graduated from Yale in 1831 and from the Episcopal Theological Seminary in Virginia in 1834. After serving as a missionary in Tennessee he moved to Texas in 1837. For a year he operated a school at Velasco, then spent some time at Houston gathering material for a history, after which he returned to New York.In the circumstances I'd say its pretty unlikely that he would need to rely on a hypothetical letter to an upstate New York newspaper for his account of the Alamo battle. Taking that particular plagiarism by Perry into account - and the charge must stand - together with the nonsense uncovered by Jim (above), his uncomradely behaviour during the Mattawamkeag incident and whatever he was playing at to get himself arrested before San Jacinto, we're getting a very long way away from a reliable witness and certainly far far away from any notion as to the veracity of the so-called lancer incident. As I said before I hold no brief for Houston, or for Sidney, but Perry was clearly a pathological liar and fantacist.
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Post by timniesen on Apr 2, 2012 12:10:12 GMT -5
Folks, I must admit that I cannot at short notice remember the source of the allusion to the Perry letter in 1836, but I do remember considering a newspaper search for it. I am currently organizing all of my thousands of papers, and I will be looking for the allusion to the Perry letter. Tim
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Post by timniesen on Apr 2, 2012 13:11:36 GMT -5
Jim, Thanks for the PDFs. It took some time for my reference librarian to find out how to print them out. You and SKR have convinced me to join the digital age! Indeed, Houston did have his supporters, but most of them were not veterans of San Jacinto. Houston certainly had a strong cult following, allowing him to be a 'dark horse' candidate in the presidential campaigns of 1856 and 1860. In the former he was a Know Nothing, and in the latter he was a Democrat. Stuart, When we had the debate over the Perry accounts in the from 2003 to 2005 period you asserted that Perry was lying about the Lancer account; now you assert that he lied all the time. TRL asks this from the grave: what motivated Perry to lie about Crockett? TRL pointed out in a phone conversation near the end of his life that Perry never emphasized the Crockett account. For instance, the account of his 1847 lectures mentions a massacre of prisoners but not Crockett. (Newspaper reports of his 1859 lectures that motivated the Houston rebuttal in the Senate have yet to be uncovered.) On the other hand, Houston had strong motivations to lie about his numerous detractors among the San Jacinto veterans. Tim
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